


dip, dip and swing

by demotu



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Camping, Canada, Canoe trips, Career-Ending Injury, M/M, Summer, Unresolved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-02
Updated: 2014-12-02
Packaged: 2018-02-27 19:41:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2704211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/demotu/pseuds/demotu
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>“Kaner, this is Jonny. Jonny, this is Patrick Kane.”</em>
  <br/>
  <em>“Yeah,” Pat says, lost for words. He takes Jonny’s hand and shakes it, watching the expressions shift and settle on Jonny's face.</em>
  <br/>
  <em>“We’ve met,” says Jonny.</em>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	dip, dip and swing

**Author's Note:**

> I owe much of this fic to both coggs and fourfreedoms. Coggs helped me work out where I was going with this, back when it was just hazy "canoe trips!" and "feelings!", listened to me whine about trying to make it more than that, and gave me knee-injury-related advice and pointed out the worst of my Canadianisms. Fourfreedoms beta'd this beautifully, poking and prodding at me to flesh out the parts I wished were artfully spare but instead were just missing. It wouldn't be half the story it is without her help.
> 
> I've tagged this as "unresolved" as a bit of an attempt to temper expectations. I think the ending is pretty resolved, myself, but it's not the ride-into-the-sunset, happily ever after that I usually go for.

~

 

_My paddle's keen and bright_  
 _Flashing with silver_  
 _Follow the wild goose flight_  
 _Dip, dip and swing_

_Dip, dip and swing her back_  
 _Flashing with silver_  
 _Swift as the wild goose flies_  
 _Dip, dip and swing_

 

~

 

“I dunno man, it sounds like a lot of work,” Pat says doubtfully, passing Matt a tall boy out of the cooler.

“Nah, dude,” Matt says, popping the tab and slurping up the head that bubbles out. “My friend Ian goes to school with a guy who’s a guide in the summer. He’ll deal with the gear and food and shit, we just have to show up.”

“And pay him?” Pat says with a grin, sprawling back in the lawn chair next to Matt.

Matt makes a face at him. “Oh yeah, tell me all about your money problems, superstar.”

Pat reaches into the cooler and flicks cool meltwater at Matt’s face. It’s hot enough Matt doesn’t look like he cares, just smears the drops across his cheek and sinks back into his chair. “It’s really fun?” Pat asks.

“The best, man,” Matt says. “Just you, the water, and the sky. And a few buddies and flasks of the good stuff. C’mon, we’re seven right now. Our guide’ll go solo, but it’ll be better with eight.”

“Sure, why not,” Pat says, throwing caution to the wind. Matt’s a fun guy, he’s got cool friends. It’d be nice to get away from his phone for a couple of weeks.

 

~

 

Pat flies up with Matt and his girlfriend, Annik, the day before the trip. He checks into his hotel while they meet up with Matt’s buddy, Ian, and then drives his rental to their address, a shambles of bricks in the student ghetto that Ian shares with the guide and three other guys. The trunk of the car in the driveway is wide open and half-packed already, so Pat leaves the SUV on the street and climbs the steps of the house, leaning inside the open door.

“Hullo?” he calls out.

A girl sticks her head out of a doorway down the hall. “You Kaner?” she asks, disappearing without waiting for an answer, and then reappearing to heft a blue barrel into the hallway with a thunk.

“Yeah,” Pat says. “Need a hand?”

The girl’s name is Dana, one half of the other couple on the trip. “Annik’s helping me keep it from being a total sausage fest,” she says, watching as Pat tries to sling the barrel over his back by its straps. He has to drop it back to the ground when he feels a muscle start to pull in his side.

“That’s nice,” Pat wheezes. “What the hell is in this?”

“Food,” Dana says with a grin. “You all right there, buddy?”

Pat shifts his stance and tries again, this time prepared, and gets it settled on his shoulders in a single, smooth motion.

“I guess you’ll be useful,” Dana says critically, grinning at Pat’s look of disbelief. “What, no point in bringing professional athletes along if we can’t take advantage.”

“I guess Matt’s been talking me up, huh?” Pat says, following her outside.

“Oh yeah,” Dana says. “Everybody but Andy has played at least midget, so if you were looking to get away from hockey, sorry.”

“Not something that really happens in my life,” Pat says. “What position d’you play?”

The smile Dana gives him is one of surprised delight. “Right wing,” she says, accepting his proffered fist bump. "I'm on the varsity team."

Dana’s boyfriend, Andy, shows up with his roommate Roshan as they get the barrel packed in the car. In the flurry of greetings, Pat doesn't notice Matt come out of the house until he’s got an arm slung around Pat’s shoulder, turning him to introduce the two remaining guys on the trip—Matt’s buddy Ian, and the guide.

Ian’s a lanky blond guy who played with Matt in bantam, but their guide—

“Kaner, this is Jonny. Jonny, this is Patrick Kane.”

“Yeah,” Pat says, lost for words. He takes Jonny’s hand and shakes it, watching the expressions shift and settle on Jonny's face.

“We’ve met,” says Jonny.

 

~

 

“Need a hand?” Pat says, leaning against the side of the car. It’s a beat-up station wagon, half-rusted out—Jonny's own, he thinks. Ian and Matt are finishing tying down the pair of canoes to the roof racks of Pat’s rented SUV.

“Sure,” Jonny says where he's tightening the tie-down on the first canoe. “Help me get the second up?”

“Will it fit?” Pat asks. He circles the car and looks at the sliver of space left over beside the first canoe.

“We’ll prop it half on top of the other one,” Jonny says, stepping away from the door of the car. He walks around to the second canoe on the grass. “Ready?”

They get it up and fastened. It looks precarious to Pat, but he figures Jonny knows what he’s doing. Jonathan _Toews_ , shit. He hasn’t seen the guy since World Juniors, not since—he wants to ask about everything, but how can he? He’s Patrick Kane, Chicago Blackhawk, and Jonny Toews…isn’t.

“Looks good,” Jonny says, standing at the hood of the car and peering critically at their work. “Should be secure.”

 

~

 

They head out early the next morning to the park—the _réserve faunique_ , to be precise. Pat drives the SUV with Matt, Annik, and Ian. It’s a lot of driving, more than he’s used to, but it means he doesn't have to sit next to Jonny and figure out how to make small talk for three hours. It’s a stupid thought, because he and Jonny have to share a canoe and a tent for the next seven days, but there’s not a whole lot he can do about that. Except keep his mouth shut and let Jonny decide how much hockey they’re going to talk.

There’s not really time for it on the first day. They stop in the town (Pat laughs—it’s a general store and some cottages on the side of the lake) for permits and then drive into the park to the put-in point. By the time they’re heading out on open water, it’s after three o’clock.

“The site’s just an hour’s paddle from here,” Jonny says, still on the rock beside the canoe. Pat turns around to watch as he steps in and pushes off in a smooth motion, settling into the stern behind him. “You don’t want to try to go too far on arrival day.”

“You’ve done this route before?” Pat asks.

“Yeah, a few times,” Jonny says as they start off. “It’s the best seven-day in the park. Most casual trippers don’t want to go for that long, though.”

“You don’t get tired of it?” Pat asks, curious.

Jonny laughs behind him. “You get tired of playing the same game every day?”

Pat twists back to look at Jonny. “Course not. But every game is different.”

“Sure,” Jonny says with a shrug, smile fading into something more intent, less open. “Every day up here’s different, too.”

Pat opens his mouth to say—

“Hurry up, losers!” Dana calls from up ahead. “You’ve got the fucking map!”

 

~

 

They turn in when the sun goes down. It’s an early night for Pat, but Ian says the sun’ll wake them up before six the next day anyway, and the bugs get frustrating enough Pat doesn’t complain. Andy douses the fire after they’ve cleaned up and Jonny hauls the barrel of food up so it’s hanging in a tree.

“Wait, so it’s called a bear barrel—”

“Because it's supposed to be bear-proof,” Jonny says with a grunt and one last heave.

“Uh,” Pat says, glancing around at the woods. “Then why are we putting it in a tree?”

Jonny grins at him, looping the rope around the trunk of the tree and securing it. “ _Supposed_ to be. Trust me, it’s better not to give them an opportunity to try.”

“Right,” Pat says faintly. “And we just lie in those tents at night and hope for the best?”

“They’re black bears,” Jonny says with a shrug. “They won’t touch you, assuming you aren’t stupid.”

They walk back over to their tent while Pat considers the distressing certainty in Jonny's statement that there _are_ black bears nearby. “What’s stupid, then?” he asks, unzipping the fly of the tent, then the door. He straightens back up to take off his shoes.

“Well, don’t keep food in the tent, or I will destroy you,” Jonny says casually, stripping off his shirt.

“Or clothes?” Pat says, raising an eyebrow as Jonny goes for his fly.

“You wanna get undressed in there, be my guest,” Jonny says, nodding at the—yeah, pretty tiny tent.

“Right,” Pat says, hoping his flush is invisible in the dim light of dusk. He ducks down to unlace his shoes and follows suit, stripping down to his boxers and then crawling in after Jonny.

“The other thing is to keep your distance from the cubs,” Jonny says, unzipping his sleeping bag and spreading it open. “Pretty much every black bear attack is because a mom gets scared for them.”

“Moms are pretty scary,” Pat admits, sprawling back on top of his own bag. It’s not exactly comfortable, but at least he has one of those paper-thin blow-up mats underneath. Jonny's got, well, pine needles and rocks. “I’ll steer clear.”

 

~

 

The party keeps together the next day. The morning has a couple of easy—says Jonny, anyway—portages. Between the eight of them they make the longer one in a single trip, which Jonny seems pleased about. Jonny, Dana, Ian and Roshan take the canoes, Jonny with his own pack as well, and the rest of them split up the gear.

“I can do a canoe,” Pat protests, watching Dana haul it up over her head in a fluid motion, settling it on her shoulders with a hard exhale.

“Yeah, no,” Jonny says with a snort. “My insurance won’t cover your back, sorry.”

“And this is better?” Pat asks, gesturing at the bear barrel and the pack he’s got on, one on his front and the other on his back. They weigh a fucking ton, and he hasn’t really started his strength training yet this summer.

“Just watch your ankles,” Jonny says, like Pat can even see his feet.

“I thought you were studying sports physio,” Pat grumbles.

“Human kinetics,” Jonny corrects. “And that just means I know just how much you can take.”

Pat raises his eyebrows at that, but says nothing more. Jonny waits until Dana’s a little ways down the trail, and then flips the canoe over his head. He settles the yoke on his shoulders, resting on the straps of his pack. When it tips forward, Pat watches the flex of his arms as he reaches out to brace them on the gunnels. “After you,” Jonny says.

 

~

 

It’s mid-afternoon before Jonny brings it up. It’s weird, trying to make small-talk without referencing hockey, but Jonny seems content to paddle in silence while Pat drinks in the scenery. That is, until Jonny asks what he’s doing for the rest of the off-season, and Pat stutters instead of outlining his training plans for the next month.

Jonny makes a displeased noise. “I can actually talk about hockey, you know?”

“I know,” Pat says, awkward. He’s glad Jonny's stuck with a view of the back of his head.

“Do you?” Jonny asks. Pat feels the canoe slow a little as Jonny eases up on his strokes, letting them fall behind the group. “Because every time it comes up, you clam up, and I’m pretty sure that’s not for your benefit.”

Pat goes quiet, considering. He listens to the soft sloshing of water around the canoe and to the catch of their paddles against the surface of the lake. It’s windy out, a few clouds keeping the sun off of their faces. Jonny says it isn’t going to rain until dark.

“I know other guys who got hurt,” Pat says eventually. “But it’s—we would have been teammates. We might have been rookies the same year, and all that.”

“You think I’m jealous of you?” Jonny asks.

Pat twists in his seat, pulling his paddle out of the water as he moves to look Jonny in the eye. “You’re saying you aren’t?”

Jonny's strokes curve out to keep the canoe from turning because Pat’s stopped paddling. He’s not looking at Pat; his eyes are fixed on the far shore when he says, “Of course I am.”

“If I’d known you were...I wouldn’t have—” Pat says, cutting himself off.

“Come to rub it in my face?” Jonny asks, mouth twisting into a small, painful smile.

“Yeah,” Pat says, gripping the gunnel tightly. “If it were me, I’d hate it.”

Jonny stops paddling, bracing the paddle across his knees. “If you avoided every person who was jealous of you right now…” Jonny says, throwing Pat a genuine, if small, grin.

Pat laughs. “I guess I wouldn’t have many friends, huh.”

“I’d guess not,” Jonny says.

 

~

 

"You are so much more chill than Luca," Dana says.

"Luca?" Pat asks. They're drifting out on the lake with the sun kissing the treeline, filling up nalgenes with the pump filters Jonny brought along. It's repetitive, relaxing work on the calm water, the soft light glinting off the surface.

"Jonny's ex," Dana says. Her nose wrinkles. "He was supposed to be our eighth, but that finally fell apart."

Pat blinks at her where she's haloed by the sunset’s oranges and golds.

"You didn't know," she says at his silence.

"Nobody mentioned," he says.

"You gonna be chill about that, too, mister hockey?"

"That's Gordie Howe," Pat says with a grin. "And it doesn't matter to me."

 

~

 

"So, Luca, huh?" Pat says while rooting around in his pack for clean boxers.

"Who told you—Dana," Jonny says.

"You could have said something."

Jonny snorts. Pat turns back to him. His knee knocks against Jonny's where he's sitting cross-legged on his sleeping bag.

"You think I care if you're gonna panic about sharing a tent with me?" Jonny asks, sneering. "You're a big boy."

The hostility startles Pat. "Fuck off, as if I care where you stick your dick."

"Even if it's in your pretty mouth?" Jonny goads.

Pat tenses, then lets it bleed out in a long exhale. "Asshole," he says lightly as he twists away to lie down. He shucks his dirty boxers in an inelegant manoeuvre and drags on his clean pair, conscious of Jonny's eyes on him the whole time.

Jonny is still until Pat's wormed into his sleeping bag, unzipped in the summer warmth. When he does move, it's to turn off the flashlight propped in the corner. There's a shuffle of polyester and the drag of a zipper, then quiet.

Pat shuts his eyes against the darkness and listens to the nighttime hum of the forest, rustling wind and distant twigs cracking and the occasional cry of something alive and hungry.

"Sorry," Jonny says.

"I’m really fine with it."

"Right."

"I mean." Pat inhales. He slides his fingers against the cool floor of the tent beside him, grit catching under his nails. "I'm okay with all of it. What you said."

Quiet again, and then, "Go to sleep, Kaner."

Pat licks his lips, the sound shockingly wet and loud in the tent, and shuts his eyes.

 

~

 

Mid-morning, on a narrow stretch of water between shore and a tall, rocky island, Pat gets tired of the quiet and says, "About last night—"

Jonny cuts him off, voice echoing clearly in the narrows. "Forget about it."

Pat glances over his shoulder and keeps his voice low, saying, "I didn't mean it like I needed to know. Just that you shouldn't have worried."

"Yeah," Jonny says. "I know. I shouldn't have snapped at you. I'm just..." he trails off. Pat can hear Jonny's sigh over the inexpert splash of his own paddle hitting water. "It's not easy for me. You being here."

Pat nods. "Could I be making it easier?"

"What, by sucking my dick?" Jonny says, sarcastic. It's supposed to be a joke, a dismissal, but Pat's stomach twists at the realisation that Jonny understood him last night.

"If you think it'd help."

"Kaner...."

"Pat," Pat says. "I'm not playing hockey here, either."

 

~

 

Jonny doesn't say yes to Pat’s offer, but neither does he say no, and when Pat knows what he wants, he finds a way to bring it home. He closes the space between them at lunch, when they break for a swim in the afternoon heat, on the portages, and at the site when they arrive. Jonny doesn’t protest. It's not subtle, but Pat finds that he wants to be near Jonny, listening to his calm explanations and instructions, his dry anecdotes of past disasters, his quiet pride when he relates his best trips. He keeps finding reasons to touch, his hands on Jonny's shoulder, his hip, the sun-browned skin of his forearm. The endless space of the Quebec backcountry shrinks to the distance between his knee and Jonny's as they crouch around the grill. If the others notice, or care, Patrick doesn’t see it, isn’t looking to.

He's half-hard when Jonny catches his eye in the evening and jerks his head towards the lake.

"You've gotta stop," Jonny says when they hit the water's edge, squinting out at the lake.

"Why?"

"Because I don't like you very much right now," he says. "I'm not gonna be able to be nice to you."

Pat looks at Jonny's profile, taking in the tense line of his jaw, the odd tufts of his hair where it dried under his ball cap. "Maybe I'm not looking for nice," he says.

"What are you looking for, then?" Jonny asks, frustrated.

"What part of 'a dick in my mouth' is complicated, man?" Pat says, glancing up the hill towards where they've set up camp. "If you're not interested, whatever. Just say so."

"I'm not interested," Jonny says flatly. "Not in some millionaire's quarter-life gay crisis."

"Wouldn't be mine," Pat says, then adds with a vicious smile, "and I'm not handing out NHL contracts to teenage washouts."

"Fuck you," Jonny says.

"Maybe not in the woods," Pat replies.

Jonny turns and walks back up the hill. Pat cups his dick and presses, thumb dragging across the head, and adjusts himself before following him back to the camp.

 

~

 

It’s a beautiful night, clear and, according to Jonny, unseasonably warm. The eight of them linger around the fire into the night, spraying foul-smelling bug spray to beat back the mosquitos and sharing a couple mickeys of whiskey Ian had carefully tucked in his pack. Pat makes sure to stay pressed against Jonny’s side, his thigh a solid line against Pat’s, the soft skin of his arm brushing Pat’s every time they shift.

Jonny’s telling them all a story about a trip from a couple years back, one he lead for a group of high school students. One of them got brutally sick partway through and Jonny had to bundle her into a sleeping bag, lay her out in a canoe, and solo her to the nearest road—a five-hour paddle and an eight hundred metre portage away.

“She was too sick to walk, it was awful,” Jonny says, shaking his head. “I had to carry her. I just had my pack, some food and my sleeping bag if I couldn’t get back before dark. I called her parents on the sat phone before I left, and they beat me to the pick-up by an hour, so I turned around and got back by dinner. I was totally wrecked, so sore the next day that I let us keep the site for an extra night.”

“Canada’s hero,” Pat drawls, snagging the mickey from Roshan and taking a gulp. “I’ll drink to that.”

“You’ll drink to anything,” says Matt with a snort.

Pat flips him off and takes another shot for good measure, then passes it off. He levers himself up with a heavy hand on Jonny’s shoulder. He doesn’t let go right away, curls his fingers against Jonny’s collarbone and thumbs at the cap of muscle. “I’m out. See you losers tomorrow.”

 

~

 

Pat hears the crunch of pine needles before the zip of the fly, and then the door of the tent slides open. Jonny tosses his flashlight into the corner and crawls in. His face is deeply shadowed, the beam of light skewed to the side and misshapen. He doesn’t look at Pat as he sprawls out next to him, knee knocking Pat’s heavily.

Pat hadn’t bothered getting undressed or into his sleeping bag. Jonny doesn’t comment on the fact that Pat’s been lying here in the dark, waiting. His eyes are shut, one hand tucked behind his head, the other spread low on his belly. Pat sits up, silent, and curves his palm over Jonny’s near thigh, just below the line of his shorts. His skin is cool from the night air, goosebumped. Pat drags his palm up, bunching the fabric and feeling the warmer flesh underneath.

He keeps his hand on Jonny as he pulls his knees under himself. Jonny’s hard, dick pushing against his shorts a couple of inches from Pat’s fingers. He can see it jerk when he drags his nails along the inside of Jonny’s thigh, back down to his knee.

He lets go, sits back. Jonny opens his eyes. Pat waits, patient, until Jonny lifts his hips to slide his shorts down. His dick bobs up, slapping against his belly. The low angle of the light makes it look thicker than it is, leaving long shadows against the muscle of his abs. Jonny presses his fingers along the ridge of it, rubs his foreskin into the swollen head, and slides a fingertip over the slit and under the skin, teasing his frenulum while Pat watches.

“Get the light,” Jonny says.

Pat blinks, looks up from his dick. “What?”

Jonny laughs at him. “Unless you want to put on a pornographic shadow puppet show.”

Pat glances behind him. “Oh,” he says. His body’s hiding the motion of Jonny working himself over, but if he bends over to suck it, the scene will play out on wall of the tent. He leans over Jonny’s chest, snagging the flashlight, and switches it off.

Jonny’s hands find his head, clumsy but deliberate. Pat lets out a sigh at the scrape of fingers against his scalp, and then bites down on a whimper when Jonny grips his hair and guides him down until Pat’s cheek slides against the head of his cock. He presses an open-mouthed kiss to Jonny’s abs, thinks about reminding Jonny to be quiet, and then about what kind of shit Jonny would say to that. He turns and sucks the head of Jonny’s cock into his mouth instead.

Pat likes his blow jobs sloppy and loud, gets hot from the wet pops of suction breaking, the squelch of too much spit, and the smack of lips. In the woods, where he can hear the low conversations trickling over from the other tents, Pat has to be careful. He swipes his tongue over the head before slowly sliding his lips down the shaft, building up a soft, suckling pressure. Jonny keeps his fingers twisted in Pat’s hair and curls his other hand around the base of his dick to hold it up. Pat’s arm shakes with effort when Jonny pushes him down to meet his fist. He takes Jonny’s cock in his throat and whines when Jonny uses his grip on Pat’s hair to pull him back up.

“Shh,” Jonny says, fisting up his dick to thumb at Pat’s lips.

He pushes Pat onto his dick again and again. Pat holds his breath until he can’t and pulls off with a gasp, turning his head away. Jonny presses his dick to Pat’s cheek, slaps it wetly, then pulls him back to it, hips rising now to meet Pat’s mouth, to _fuck_ it.

Pat’s jaw aches by the time Jonny comes. He chokes and draws back until Jonny’s other hand comes up to cup his chin, holding Pat still while his dick pulses under Pat’s tongue.

“Shit,” Pat rasps when Jonny finally lets him pull off. He unfolds his legs and lies down, panting. “Some warning, bro.”

“Not getting dirty for you,” Jonny says. “You wanna suck dick in a tent, you swallow.”

Pat doesn’t have any real objection to what went down, so he just shrugs and palms himself, pushing his board shorts over his hips. He won’t need much, starts a fast, short stroke under the head of his dick, eyes falling shut. He’s almost there when Jonny’s hand slides low on his stomach, pushing in to the tensing muscle.

“Fuck,” he says, curling in in surprise, a jolt of heat zinging through his balls. ”You want to?”

Jonny laughs; it’s looser now that he’s come. “What, you think I’d call no homo?” he says in a husky whisper that’s nearly as hot as his nails dragging through Pat’s pubes. He curls his hand around Pat’s sac, filling his palm with it and pushing it up against the base of Pat’s dick. “That good?”

“Mm,” Pat hums. He’s slowed his stroke to draw it out, to keep from shooting before Jonny’s finished touching him. “Tighter.”

Jonny squeezes his balls, pressure ratcheting up until Pat gasps. “Like that?”

“Yeah,” Pat says. He’s hardly jerking his dick anymore, just squeezing the head in the palm of his hand, echoing Jonny’s grip on his balls. A finger slips lower, pressing into Pat’s perineum, a sharper spike of pleasure than the palm on his belly.

Pat curls his toes, presses his heels down. “Yeah, fuck,” he says, too loud. There’s a shuffle next to him, then Jonny’s other hand is on his chin, his fingers pushing into Pat’s mouth, sliding against his swollen lips until he closes around them.

He’s gone, then, jerking himself quickly as Jonny thumbs at his jaw and keeps his fingers curled around Pat’s balls and rubs below. He barely remembers to catch his come in the palm of his hand when he shoots, sucking Jonny’s fingers desperately to keep from moaning.

“Sweet,” he says afterwards, holding his jizz carefully and blinking into the black.

Jonny snorts, back on his side of the tent. “Go clean up.”

“Yeah,” Pat says groggily. Jonny opens the tent while he struggles one-handed with his shorts, and shoves the flashlight at him.

“Don’t drown.”

Pat flicks the flashlight on and shines it in Jonny’s face, grinning at his flinch.

“Never mind,” Jonny says, ducking his head and zipping up the tent. “Please do.”

 

~

 

The fourth day starts with a flurry of portages and quick paddles. They cross small, glimmering lakes, limned with leaning cedars and upright pines, to where the water runs out in dammed-up, trickling streams or fast-moving chutes. It’s blisteringly hot by mid-morning. Pat’s thoroughly sick of unloading and reloading the canoe by the fourth time, but the workout of the portages, carting heavy gear through narrow, buggy trails, gets his heart pumping like a good shift.

“How come you can do this but not play hockey?” Pat asks, setting down the barrel with a _thunk_ and then sitting heavily on top of it. They'd beat the rest of the group on the long portage; Jonny might not be a full-time athlete anymore, but he clearly takes pride in his fitness.

“This?” Jonny asks, voice echoing oddly inside the canoe. Pat watches as he swings the canoe over his head and lets it roll down his body, coming to a rest braced on his hip, his strong torso twisted to keep his grip, tendons standing out along his forearms.

When Jonny puts it down gently on the pine-needle-strewn dirt and turns back to him, Pat gestures back at the narrow path they took along the river where Andy’s emerging with the second canoe. “Carry canoes along perilous paths. Haul gear. This.”

“Time,” Jonny says. “The worst of it took a year, and I started canoe tripping casually after two years. As long as I’m careful, hiking doesn’t put a lot of strain on it. It’s just walking with heavy things, right?”

Pat nods, asks, “Can you skate?”

“Yeah, recreationally.” Pat winces. “Can’t really play, though. The torque would wreck it.” He gives Pat a measured gaze, considering, and then offers, “So I don’t. Skate.”

After they’ve gone back and helped carry the last of the gear down the portage and then climbed back into the canoes, Pat finds himself taking a breath and then releasing it, words caught on his tongue. Jonny has them pull ahead, gliding across the lake on strong strokes, searching for the precise curve of the shoreline that leads in towards the final portage of the day. He brings them right up to the far shore before Pat finds his nerve.

“I get why you hate me,” he says.

“What?” Jonny says, paddle catching in the water and spraying the side of the canoe. “Who said I hated you?”

Pat shoves his sunglasses up the bridge of his nose with the back of his wrist. “You did?” he says.

“I said I didn’t _like_ you very much,” Jonny says. “That’s not—I don’t hate you. That’s about me, anyway.”

“Shit, man,” Pat says. “If I were you, I couldn’t deal with this like you are.”

“Oh no?” Jonny says. There’s something amused flitting across his voice, and Pat braces his paddle on his knees and turns back to look at him.

“You’re telling me you don’t hate me for making it, when you didn’t?”

Jonny frowns. “Jesus, no,” he says.

“Really?” Pat says, doubtful. “I play for the team that drafted you, and you never got a single game. That’s gotta sting.”

“It’s not like that,” Jonny says, shaking his head. “It’s not that you play hockey and I don’t, Kaner. You were going to make it, whether or not I did.”

“I was, huh?” Pat says, smirk falling into place on reflex.

“You were always going to be a star,” Jonny says, mouth twisting back into a half-smile. “It was written all over you right from the start.”

“Not many people thought so, before the Knights,” Pat says.

“I did,” Jonny says.

Pat stares at Jonny, wishing he could see Jonny’s eyes behind his sunglasses. “Yeah?” he says. He swallows. “When?”

“First time I saw you play,” Jonny says, easy as anything, like they hadn’t been children, like Pat remembers more than hazy stats and slices of emotion from that tournament. “You were amazing. And I could tell you were like me.”

“Good?” Pat asks.

Jonny shakes his head. “Determined to make it, no matter what.”

 

~

 

The heat builds, an attractive force that draws clouds together overhead, thickening to black on the horizon and inching closer. Jonny stops them early and tells them to set up the tents, fast. They save their cold lunch for dinner and he starts on the fire, rushing to cook the rice and tuna curry before the rain starts.

The sky opens up as Annik’s serving it out, and they eat standing in a damp huddle under the tarp Roshan and Andy strung between four trees. The downpour is a relief, cooling the air and lifting Pat out of his heat-induced exhaustion.

"What now?" asks Matt, thunder blanketing his question.

"Naps," says Jonny, tossing his bowl by the fire. "It’ll clear up in an hour or two."

They disperse through the trees to their tents. The rain is torrential, soaking Pat to the bone before he can unzip the fly. Jonny strips down to nothing and dives into the tent, and Pat follows suit.

"Holy shit," Pat says, falling on his stomach with a panting laugh. "It’s like a shower. One of those crazy waterfall ones in a five-star hotel. "

"I’ll take your word for it," Jonny says, kneeling behind him to zip the tent closed. His wrist brushes Pat’s calf, and Pat turns his face into his arms. The sound of the rain on the tent is shockingly loud, drowning out his groan when Jonny smacks him on the hip and settles in next to him.

Pat breathes shallowly into the damp skin of his bicep, his hair dripping into his eyes, as Jonny strokes up his thighs and over his ass. His fingers are light, touch remaining chaste except for how he works inwards, thumbs gliding over Pat’s crack but not sliding deeper in.

Pat shifts against his sleeping bag, curls his chin down and arches his lower back. Jonny laughs and smacks him again, this time low on his ass. A whine catches in Pat’s throat.

"Alright?" Jonny says.

"Just touch me, you fuck," Pat says, rocking back against Jonny’s palms, spread wide on his skin.

"Hm," Jonny says, reaching between Pat’s legs and tugging his balls. Pat shivers, spreading his thighs. Jonny moves his thumb along Pat’s perineum and back in a glacial drag, so slow Pat’s holding his breath, anticipating. The first touch to his rim arcs through him and makes him spasm, gasping into his arms.

"Oh shit," he says when Jonny spreads his cheeks wide and traces his hole completely. "That’s, shit."

Jonny lets go entirely. Pat shudders and says, "What?”

"Thought you said this wasn’t your gay crisis," Jonny says against his ear, shifting until he’s holding himself over Pat. Pat turns his head, blinking.

"Do I look like I’m having a crisis?" He cants back on his elbows until his ass pushes up against Jonny’s cock.

"You look like a guy who’s never had his ass touched,” Jonny says, derisive. His hips twitch anyway, dick sliding dry over Pat’s hole.

"You want a complete sexual history before you’ll do it?" Pat asks.

Jonny turns his face and bites down on Pat’s shoulder, drops his weight and forces Pat back to the ground. He grinds his hips down, and Pat whimpers. The press of Jonny’s body is so good, but the thin mattress is little protection for his dick, caught against his hip.

"Ow, fuck, don’t break my dick," he pants, struggling against Jonny. Jonny presses an arm across his shoulder blades, pinning him down, and lets some of the weight off Pat’s hips. Pat jerks when he grabs Pat’s cock and angles it down until it’s between his thighs instead.

"Better?" Jonny says, dropping back down to smother him.

"Yeah," Pat says, short of breath. Jonny slides his hands under Pat’s chest, curling them over Pat’s shoulders, and starts thrusting with firm strokes that press his cock between Pat's cheeks. Pat closes his legs, trying to get some pressure on his cock, some recognizable sensation as a counterpoint to the foreign press of Jonny’s dick against his asshole, catching on the rim when Jonny shifts. He can’t find it, so he turns his face instead and licks at Jonny’s open mouth until he kisses back, swallowing Jonny’s grunts.

Jonny comes low onto his back, his hips pressing against the swell of Pat’s ass, fingernails sunk into Pat’s shoulders. Pat’s the one who cries out, tearing his mouth away from Jonny’s and burying his face in his bicep to muffle the sound.

Jonny unwraps his arms and pushes up with a hand between Pat’s shoulderblades. He slides his other hand down and rubs his fingers through the spunk pooling in the hollow of Pat’s spine, and then lower. Pat shudders at the slick drag between his cheeks, his breath fast and shallow in his chest.

"Relax," Jonny says, rubbing between his shoulderblades.

"You’re a goddamn tease," Pat mumbles, and then bites down on his arm when Jonny presses the wet tip of a finger to his hole.

Jonny doesn’t slide in. Like with his dick, it’s an echo of fucking; this one gentle and suggestive where the frottage was heavy and overwhelming. He gets Pat’s hole wet with his own come and rubs and presses and pushes with the tip of his finger until Pat feels himself spasm open, his dick jerking where it’s caught between his thighs. Jonny draws down to press on Pat’s balls and rub his dick with the back of his knuckles, Pat squirming and panting and begging to be pushed over the edge.

An age later, when Pat’s stopped asking for lack of words, Jonny rolls him to his back and jerks his dick and shoves a finger in knuckle deep for Pat to come on, muscles contracting as he spills with a cry that’s swallowed up by the pounding rain.

"Holy shit," Pat says when he’s come down enough to shiver, damp with rain and spunk and sweat in the cooling air of the tent. "I told you this was a good idea."

Jonny laughs. He rubs at his knee, stretched out in front of him, and glances down at Pat. "Yeah, maybe."

Pat whacks him on the hip. "If this is you not being nice, man, I’d like to see how you treat somebody real good.”

"I, uh, I’m a lot less," he waves at Pat’s sprawled form unhelpfully.

Pat squints at him. "Pushy?"

"Yeah," Jonny says. "If that’s not—you said…"

"It’s cool," Pat says, yawning. He glances down his chest at the mess. He’s sticking to his sleeping bag, though he thinks Jonny smeared his come around enough there won’t be any obvious white spots. “I told you what I wanted, anyway.”

Jonny lets out a huff of breath. “True. That’s a nice change.”

“From Luca?” Pat hazards, cleaning himself off.

“Yeah,” Jonny says. He rubs the palm of his hand across his jaw, tracking Patrick’s movements with his gaze. “He’s never been good at figuring out what he wants, let alone asking for it.”

Pat tosses a balled-up bit of toilet paper at Jonny, who makes a face and bats it back at him. “Hey man,” he says with a grin, “I am happy to keep asking if you’re gonna keep saying yes.”

 

~

 

The rain slows down to a persistent drizzle for much of the afternoon. Pat puts on dry clothes and takes a post-fuck nap, coming slowly awake as the steady hum of the rain disappears, replaced by the thick, irregular splats of water dripping off the trees overhead. Jonny’s propped up against his pack, reading a battered copy of _The Once and Future King_.

“Good book?” Pat stretches his limbs with a groan and sits up, head brushing the damp side of the tent. There’s a bit of water pooled in the corner by his head, but they’ve stayed more or less dry.

“Yep,” Jonny says. He lets the book fall onto his chest and looks over at Pat.

“What’s it about?” Pat asks, reaching over to pull it into his hands.

Jonny lets him take it and watches as Pat flips through it, his thumb marking Jonny’s spot.

“Destiny,” Jonny says dryly. “It’s a retelling of Arthurian legend.”

“What, like, the sword in the stone?” Pat asks, curious.

Jonny snorts. “Yeah, it has that bit, but it’s a lot better than the Disney movie. It’s kind of a collection of stories. The later ones are a lot darker, once Arthur grows up.”

“So it gets better?” Pat asks.

Jonny shakes his head. “Just different. The beginning has my favourite story, about King Pellinore and the Questing Beast.”

“I don’t know it,” Pat says, passing the book back.

“It’s about this King,” Jonny says.

“Pellinore.”

“Right, and he spends all his time on an ancestral quest to hunt a mythical beast,”

“The Questing Beast,” Pat adds, then grins at Jonny’s quelling look. “Sorry, go on.”

“Uhuh,” Jonny says, lips quirking up. “Anyway, he gives up on his quest one winter, except it turns out the Beast can’t live without him hunting it, and it gets sick and starts to die. So Pellinore goes and nurses the Beast back to health, sets it free, and then starts hunting it again.”

“Does he catch him after?” Pat asks.

“Nope,” Jonny says. “That’s the point, he never really can.”

Pat frowns. “That seems dumb.”

Jonny shrugs. “I dunno, it’s funny in the book. I think it’s a metaphor, anyway.”

“For what?” Jonny makes a face, and Pat pokes him in the shoulder. “C’mon, man.”

Jonny turns the book over in his hands. “I read it the first time when I was—after the accident?” He glances at Pat, who nods his understanding. “I thought it was about the importance having a purpose, something you’re aiming for in life. The Beast’s purpose was to be hunted, and when Pellinore stopped, it started dying.”

“Makes sense,” Pat says. He thinks about being nineteen, and how it would have felt to be told he’d never play again. It hurts too much to linger on, so he pushes it aside. “But you changed your mind?”

“Yeah, well, that only makes sense for the Beast, right?” Jonny says, rubbing his thumb over the cover. “Pellinore is fine, when he stops hunting. He’s a man, not a magical creature. He could do other things with his life, but instead he went back and took care of the Beast.”

Pat frowns. “What’s the metaphor, then?”

“I think—I dunno. Maybe I’m wrong, but for me, it says that we’re responsible for feeding our own obsessions, or own demons, whatever,” Jonny says. “And that we get too comfortable with them to let them die. You’ve gotta learn to let go.”

“Did you learn?” Pat asks, thoughtless. He flushes when Jonny raises his eyebrows at him, but he holds his gaze.

“I had to,” Jonny answers.

 

~

 

That night, Pat turns towards Jonny and says, “So hockey was your Questing Beast?”

Jonny shifts in his sleeping bag. “Seriously?” he asks.

“What?” Pat says. “I’m just wondering.” He’s been turning it over in his head since Jonny told him the story, unable to stop wondering how somebody as good and as dedicated and as _close_ as Jonny could get hockey stripped away and be whole. He is, though—Jonny has a life, friends and hobbies and a job and a future he seems content with.

“No, hockey wasn’t my Questing Beast,” Jonny says, beleaguered. “Losing it was.”

Pat looks up at the roof of the tent. “You aren’t fucked up about it.”

“I was,” Jonny says. “I could still be.”

“You let it die?”

“As much as I could,” Jonny says. “This week…it’s been a good test.”

“How’s that going?” Pat asks.

“Well,” Jonny says dryly. “I’m glad there’s only a limited supply of alcohol.”

Pat chuckles. “I wish you’d been there with me,” he says. “I’m sure not as much as you do, but it’s something I thought about. If it would have been easier if we’d gone in together.”

“You had a rough couple of years,” Jonny observes.

Pat makes an unseen face. “Well, it wasn’t that bad. I was playing.”

“Hockey isn’t everything,” Jonny says.

“Hah,” Pat says. “Never got a chance to learn that one.”

“You will,” Jonny says. “Nobody plays forever.”

“Jesus,” Pat says. “Don’t remind me.”

“Sorry,” Jonny says. “It’s not something I can forget.”

“I didn’t mean—”

“Whatever,” Jonny interrupts.

Pat shuts his eyes and blows out a breath. “You’ve got your shit figured out, though. I just—I’m not sure I would have. Even by now.”

“Alright,” Jonny says, forestalling any further ramblings. “Thanks, I guess.”

“Sorry,” Pat offers.

“It’s fine,” Jonny says, sounding tired.

It takes Pat a while to fall asleep, imagining what could have been.

 

~

 

Over breakfast, Ian tells Pat how he’d been in a debate with some buddies over Pat’s contract negotiations a few weeks back. “I’ve been holding my tongue, but you seem cool,” Ian says, passing Pat a bowl of instant oatmeal. “Is it as messed up as it looks in the news?”

Pat digs a clean-ish spoon out of the cutlery bag. “I don’t have much to do with them, honestly. My agent does most of the talking. I just get the updates.”

Matt snorts, making Pat shove over to fit next to him. “Sure, buddy,” he says. “Not like you’ve been stressing over it for months.”

Ian tips his head. “They’re saying online that—”

“I don’t read the press,” Pat says, cutting him off. It’s too harsh, and he regrets it for the shamed look on Ian’s face. “Sorry,” he says, raising one shoulder. “It’s—yeah. It’s not been fun. I’m kind of trying not to think about it much.”

“That’s why I invited you,” Matt says, jostling him. “No Brisson here.”

When Pat looks up after clearing his bowl, he catches Jonny watching him from the other side of the fire pit, expression unreadable.

 

~

 

They leave the open expanse of the lake for a narrow river midday, paddling between etched-out cliffs on quick currents and over shallow, eroded flats filled with weeds and deadwood and damselflies.

“You mean—dragonflies?” Pat says, peering at the pair of definitely-mating insects on the thwart of the canoe.

“Nope,” says Jonny. He’s leaning forward on his paddle, braced across the gunnels. “Related, but the long skinny ones are damselflies. The blue ones are really common.”

“They’re pretty,” Pat comments absently. “Haven’t seen much wildlife, though.” A few birds of prey at a distance, dark silhouettes against blue sky. A pair of muskrats playing along the river, this morning. Nothing else beyond the screeching red squirrels who made mad dashes for their leftovers.

“Beavers are nocturnal, so they’re always asleep when we go by, same as a lot of rodents,” Jonny says, settling back into his seat. He stretches out his bad leg, tucking it into the side of the canoe like he always does. He told Pat to kneel as much as he could, for a stronger stroke, but he never does himself. “Deer and moose, but deer are too skittish to sneak up on. Sometimes you see them drinking at the shore, if you get up early enough. Moose are a lot rarer, but they don’t give a fuck if you get near, so you can watch when you find them, that’s pretty cool.”

“And the bears?” Pat asks, twisting in his seat.

“Seen one once,” Jonny says. “On a portage, eating blueberries.”

“Shit,” Pat says. “Did he see you?”

“Yup,” Jonny says. He slips his paddle into the water, steering them around the worn trunk of a drowned tree.

“What did you do?”

“Backed away slowly,” Jonny says. “And decided to take a different route.”

 

~

 

Now that they’ve made something more productive out of the tension between them, Pat finds Jonny surprisingly easy to talk to. Pat’s not chatty by nature, but Jonny draws it out of him with solemnity and sarcasm by turns. It’s good, because they spend hours together with only ten feet between them. Jonny’s alternated between their canoe taking the lead and sweeping at the rear, but on the river, with little need to navigate, he lets them trail behind at an easy pace.

They talk about everything—Jonny’s program, Pat’s summer plans, both devolving into debates on nutrition and training. They talk about trips they’ve taken, by plane for Pat and by canoe for Jonny, and food they’d be eating right now if they weren’t in the middle of nowhere. They talk about the league, mostly in the abstract, teams other than the Hawks and their post-season signings and draft picks, conversation meandering like the river until Jonny asks him about the Hawks prospects.

“Couple promising D-men,” Pat says. “None with any games up, though, and it’s so hard to tell before they hit the show. I guess I’ll see then, if I’m there in the fall,” Pat says, and then shuts his mouth with a snap.

“You’re really thinking of signing somewhere else?” Jonny asks.

He sounds…flat. Disapproving, and that rankles Pat. “What if I was?” he says. “It’s not your business.”

“Never said it was,” Jonny says. “It’s just a question, you don’t need to get defensive about it.”

Pat exhales through his teeth. “Well, a lot of people think they get to have something to say about it, okay? I don’t need your commentary, too.”

“Jesus,” Jonny mutters, then says, louder, “Fine, don’t talk about it, I don’t give a fuck about your spoiled superstar angst anyway.”

“Oh, fuck off,” Pat says. “You think everything’s been handed to me? I work my ass off for the Hawks, so they can god-damned appreciate it.”

Jonny’s quiet for a moment, then says, “I know you work hard. I was—I got to the door. Maybe I never... but I know how much it takes to get that far.”

Pat bites down on his tongue, pushes it into his teeth, and exhales. “Yeah. I was—”

“I get it.”

“It’s different,” Pat says. “Being a UFA. I didn’t get that, before. Not when I was a kid, or last time I signed. And nothing’s...it’s all lined up, you know?”

“Chosen for you,” Jonny says in agreement. “Now you get to pick what you want, eh?”

“Yeah,” Pat says.

“And the Hawks aren’t it?”

“I don’t know,” Pat says heavily. “And that’s—I thought I would know.”

 

~

 

For the first time it gets cold as the sun goes down. They switch out their shorts for pants, pull on hoodies, and build the fire up. The site is a sandy beach tucked into a wide curve of the river, a pleasant change from rocky woods. Pat’s hands are freezing by the time he’s done rinsing the dishes out, handing them to Matt to dry and put away without coating them with sand. Matt seals up the bear barrel and they wander over to the firepit, the sun just disappearing behind the trees.

“No more rocks in my spine, Christ,” Andy says with a sigh, sprawled out in the sand with his head in Dana’s lap. “Beach sites forever, guys.”

“Sure, but,” Jonny says, leaning against a driftwood log, “sand gets _everywhere_. Trust me, you’re gonna want to pack up and get the hell out of here by morning.”

“But rocks, Jonny,” Dana says, running her fingers through Andy’s hair until it stands up straight. “Rocks in spines. Rocks as pillows. That one rock last night that was somehow underneath both my elbows.”

Jonny’s lips quirk up in a grin. “Yeah, okay.” He keeps smiling as Pat slides down beside him, no space between them at all. “Sup?”

“Freezing,” Pat says, tucking himself in beside Jonny and blowing on his hands. “What happened to summer?”

“That was a fluke,” Jonny says. “I told you you'd use your warm clothes.”

“Shit, you weren’t kidding,” Pat says.

“Whiner,” Jonny says, but he wraps an arm around Pat and pulls him in until he’s got no choice but to tuck his hands under Jonny’s sweater and press his chilly fingers to warm skin. Jonny muffles his yelp into Pat’s shoulder and throws his leg over Pat’s thigh. Pat hides his grin in Jonny’s hair and holds on.

 

~

 

“Fuck, you’re right,” Pat says as he stands by the door of the tent and tries to get all the sand off. “This is nuts.”

“Just get in here,” Jonny says, unzipping his sleeping bag and unfolding it. “We’ll shake it out in the morning.”

It’s different, in the cold. They don’t undress. Pat keeps his fingers in the warm spaces between cotton and skin, tracing the lines of Jonny’s back while Jonny presses his cold nose into Pat’s neck. Jonny’s hand grips Pat’s thigh and slides over his ass, tugging him in until there’s a line of heat between them, building as they rub together. There’s hardly any light, just soft, washed-out shadows in the little moonlight that filters through the tent fly and mesh.

Pat digs his nails in; Jonny pulls them tight together and grunts, head dipping to exhale heavily against Pat’s throat. “Wait,” he says, pushing Pat back with a palm on his chest.

“Knee good?” Pat asks, feeling him flex.

“Other side’s better,” Jonny admits.

“We can switch,” Pat offers.

“Nah,” Jonny says in a whisper, smile in his voice. He flips around, hands finding Pat’s legs to push him into place until Jonny’s tucked his head into the curve of Pat’s knee. Pat makes a pleased sound and presses his cheek to Jonny’s thigh as Jonny unzips his fly, drawing him out into the chill.

“Fuck,” Pat says when Jonny licks the tip of his cock. Jonny shifts his hips, impatient, and Pat mirrors him, working Jonny’s dick out and thumbing at the wet head. Jonny exhales, draws in a breath, and sucks him in, tucking his hand between Pat’s thighs. Pat tilts his head back and swallows to stop up the groan in his throat.

“It’s crazy,” Pat whispers, later, sleeping bag zipped up against the cold.

“What is?” Jonny asks. His voice is rough with the promise of sleep and the remnants of sex.

“Meeting you like this.”

“Now?” Jonny asks. “Or here? Or doing—this?”

“Yeah,” says Pat.

 

~

 

In the morning, Pat gets up early with Jonny, following him into the damp chill while the others sleep on. The wander along the riverbank and up into the bush to get enough firewood, little sticks for kindling and dry driftwood that burns bright and leaves hot coals to boil water over. Jonny shucks his sandals and rolls up his pants to fill up the pot with water a few feet in from the riverbank, where the water runs clear. Pat gets it settled over the grill and then opens up the barrel while Jonny props his feet up by the fire.

“There are eggs near the bottom,” Jonny says, watching Pat dig out the dwindling bag of instant oatmeal.

Pat shoves the mess around without luck. “Where?”

“Carton?” Jonny says.

“Huh?” Pat says, but he’s pulling out a milk carton that says _liquid egg_ on the side. “What the fuck.”

Jonny laughs. “What, you think I’d packed a few dozen eggs at the bottom of the barrel?”

“I dunno,” Pat says, squinting at the label. “I didn’t watch you cook. What is this shit?”

“Eggs, already cracked and mixed together.”

“And it’s safe?” Pat asks.

“Never done me any damage,” Jonny says, then rolls to his feet with a groan. “Pass ‘em over.”

Sketch or not, the eggs are delicious, hot and rich and filling. There’s nothing in them but salt and oil, but like everything Pat’s eaten on the trip, they’re beyond satisfying. He says as much, and Jonny nods, leaning over to steal a forkful of Pat’s double-serving.

“Hey,” Pat says mildly, watching Jonny’s eyes fall shut in pleasure as he swallows.

“Everything just tastes better out here,” Jonny says. “Like food after a game, but even more than that. The exertion, yeah, and then the fresh air, and making it yourself on a fire—I dunno. It can be freeze-dried crap and it’s still better than mom’s home cooking.”

“For real,” Pat says, pushing his bowl out on his knee so Jonny can keep eating out of it. “But don’t tell my mom that.”

“Scary, right?” Jonny says with a grin. Pat shoulders him and takes back his bowl to clean it out.

 

~

 

There’s talk of shuffling the canoes around, that morning. Pat and Jonny are in the best shape, and Dana says she needs a day away from Andy if they aren’t going to kill each other. Pat does want to be an asshole and refuse to switch, but he doesn’t want to split up from Jonny, either. He feels pathetic about it and keeps silent during the discussion before heading off to piss in the woods.

When he comes back, everyone else has shuffled around except for Jonny, who’s waiting by their beached canoe.

“Nobody wanted you, eh?” Pat jokes, relieved. He crawls into the bow, sinking front in deeper with his weight so Jonny can push them off.

“Couldn’t unload your fat ass,” Jonny says, flicking water at him with his paddle as he settles into the stern.

Pat restrains himself from starting a war and smirks over his shoulder. “Liar. You just didn’t want to lose out on my awesome company.”

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Jonny deadpans. He splashes at Pat again, and says, “For real, though—if you wanted to switch…”

“Nah, I’m good here,” Pat says lightly.

“Good,” Jonny echoes. “We make a good team.”

Pat turns his head, meeting Jonny’s eyes. Jonny raises a shoulder, Pat inclines his head, and they move on, following the current down the river.

 

~

 

The day remains grey and chilly but the clouds are light and they stay dry. It’s another day full of portages as they work their way back around to the put-in point, and Pat alternates between too hot on the trail and to cold in the canoe with the wind working against them. By the time they arrive at the night’s camp, he’s tired and hungry and would be grumpy if it weren’t for Jonny at his back, keeping them moving with encouraging words and promises of hot food.

“How are you single, Jonny?” Annik sighs when he delivers with pasta in a rehydrated meat sauce that Pat thinks should be gross but tastes like something from a three-star restaurant. “You cook, clean, carry canoes and from what I’ve _heard_ ,” she says with a grin, “are great in the sack. A man like that shouldn’t be alone.”

“Thanks, but I’m not, really,” says Jonny, and Pat’s smirk freezes on his lips.

Annik cocks her head, eyes flicking to Pat. “You mean—”

“No, it’s—” Jonny starts, hand coming up to the back of his neck. He’s blushing, Pat notes abstractly, and refusing to look over at Pat. “I’m not _not_ single, we’re just...my...Luca and I are ‘on a break’,” he finishes awkwardly, making half-hearted finger quotes down by his hip.

“Ah,” Annik says.

“Jesus,” mutters Matt. “So how about the Leafs, eh?”

“It’s off-season,” Roshan says blankly.

“And they _still_ suck.”

 

~

 

Jonny finds Pat kneeling in the tent after dinner, digging through his pack for a clean pair of socks.

“You okay?” he asks, low by the door in that awkward sideways crouch of his, his bad leg stretched out to one side.

Pat ignores him and turns his pack over, dumping everything onto the tent floor. Jonny crawls in and zips the tent shut behind him. The firepit’s not even fifteen feet away; it’s an illusion of privacy, at best.

“I thought you knew,” Jonny says, settling into the corner. “Dana—”

“—said he was your ex.”

Jonny blows out a breath. “Oh. She’s never liked him much.”

Pat shrugs. “Whatever, man.”

“We really are on a break,” Jonny says. “He decided to, uh, find himself, or some shit. He’s cycling through Central America right now.”

“I really,” Pat says slowly, sorting through his gear, “really, do not care.”

“Right,” Jonny says, tense. “‘Cause you’re sure acting like it.”

“Fuck off,” Pat says. He finally finds his socks and pulls them on before crawling over to open the tent back up. “You’re a great vacation fuck, Toews. Let’s not pretend this is anything else, okay?”

 

~

 

Pat’s head is buzzing throughout the rest of the evening, forcibly blank but distracting all the same. It’s the kind of feeling he normally drinks through, but they’re down to one carefully-saved flask of Baileys that gets split between eight hot chocolates. Pat takes his from Matt and sits down next to him instead of in the space they’ve left next to Jonny. He drinks his hot chocolate fast enough to scald his throat and then heads for the lake, mumbling something about the stars. The sky’s cleared up, at least.

Pat can’t pick out a single constellation. At night, he plays, he sleeps, he drinks. In the off-season, he sees his friends, works out, goes to his parents’ for dinner. He watches the highlights alone and watches game tape with trainers and watches movies with friends and never looks at the sky. It’s not much to see in the city anyway. Nothing like this, so full of stars it’s not black anymore, instead a shimmering dome bisected by a thick band of hazy light.

“It's getting late,” says Jonny.

Pat closes his eyes, opens them. The longer he looks, the more he can see, tiny pricks of light beside the brightest stars filling in the gaps until there’s no point in mapping out constellations at all.

“Are you seriously mad at me about this?” Jonny asks, not the kind of guy to leave well enough alone.

“Nah,” Pat says, tilting his head back on his arm. “It wasn’t like—you said you weren’t gonna be nice.”

Jonny laughs, low in his chest. “Then what?” he asks, sliding into the dirt next to him, his wrist brushing Pat’s. “You seemed pissed.”

“At me,” Pat admits. “For forgetting what this is. That it’s. Temporary.”

“What did you think was gonna happen?” Jonny asks. “Tomorrow, when we get back to the city? That I was gonna come hang out at your Buffalo mansion? Quit my program and move to Chicago?” He sounds more curious than belligerent.

“No,” says Pat, sighing. “I didn’t really think about it at all. Fuck. Is it just me?” he asks, turning his head to look at Jonny, washed silver and grey in the moonlight.

There's a beat, just enough time for Pat to start cringing, before Jonny says, "No. No, it's not just you."

Pat swallows. "Thought maybe you still didn't like me very much."

Jonny exhales, just a breath of a laugh. "I've been trying not to," he says, lying down flat next to him. "But I still see—you’re still that kid to me, showing the rest of us up as easily as breathing, like you were born for it. It’s...” Jonny passes a hand over his face, and then reaches up, fingers spreading open in a wordless gesture against the black, before his arm falls to the ground between them.

“I wasn’t sure,” Pat says.

“Maybe I'm just more practiced at this than you," Jonny offers.

"At guys?" Pat asks.

"Nah—well, maybe?" Jonny says, turning his head. "I don't really know. But I meant, at letting go of things I can't have."

"Ah," says Pat. He looks back up at the sky, chewing on his lip. "The other one, though, that's...something I let go of. Let die."

"Fucking guys?" Jonny asks.

"Yeah, I mean," Pat fumbles. "I wasn't lying. This isn't a crisis or whatever. But I had a career, I have hockey. It wasn't necessary. It's not like there's been anybody."

"No broken hearts?" Jonny jokes.

"Not yet," Pat says, wry. "You?"

"Just hockey," Jonny says, so painfully sincere Pat wants to cry.

"Shit," Pat said, choked up. "Jonny, I'm really—"

"It's fine," Jonny says. He unfolds his arm and tugs Pat in. Pat takes a deep, steadying breath and watches the stars.

 

~

 

It’s only a three hour’s paddle back to the cars the next morning, but it’s cool and drizzling the entire way. In the rain, coming from the other direction, Pat hardly recognizes the lake, but Jonny leads them unerringly to the put-in where the dirt path back to the road is well worn and muddy. Pat’s wet through by the time they’ve packed up their gear and tied down the canoes. Turning on the heat in the SUV, middle of the summer or not, is a relief. They’re all covered in a layer of mud; Pat’s going to have to throw some money for cleaning at the rental agency.

They drive out of the rain by late afternoon and stop in a small town for their first non-camping food in a week. They’re too filthy to try the only restaurant on the strip, some family-style place with a plywood front built up and painted to look like a castle. Pat isn’t too sorry to be giving it a miss in favour of a fast food shack on the other side of the highway.

“Casse-croûte,” Jonny corrects.

“Bless you,” says Pat, and then sticks his tongue out at Jonny’s exasperated face. “I know what a casse-croûte is.”

This one’s serious business, though, two windows with middle-aged francophone women taking orders, a long menu with a longer line-up of cottagers and locals, and a patio of picnic tables under a canvas roof. Pat says it’s his treat and lingers with Jonny at the back of the group, but Jonny orders for both of them in easy French after asking what he wants.

“Une grande poutine, un hamburger, deux cheeseburgers, avec—Pat, what do you want on them?”

“Uh,” Pat says, squinting at the plastic menu propped outside. “All dressed?”

“Tomate, laitue, cornichon, ketchup, moutarde sur les cheeseburgers, le hamburger aussi mais sans moutarde,” Jonny reels off. “Frites, grosses, et deux Pepsi, s’il te plaît.”

“What, you couldn’t just say ‘all dressed’ in French?” Pat asks while they’re leaning against the fence, waiting for their order to be called. “It was on the menu.”

“Sure, tout garni.” Jonny makes a face. “But you gotta be careful with that, here. Sometimes it gets you coleslaw. On your burger.”

“What?” Pat says, squinting over his sunglasses at Jonny. “Why?”

Jonny shrugs. “Beats me. I’m from Winnipeg, they don’t do that shit there.”

When they’ve commandeered a picnic table and started in on their happily coleslaw-free burgers, Pat says, “Holy shit, I take it back, _this_ is the best thing I’ve ever eaten.”

Everyone else is too far into their food to do more than groan in agreement. Pat’s seen tables of hockey players after double overtime inhale their food with more grace than this group. It doesn’t take more than five minutes before he’s swiping up the rest of the salt at the bottom of his box of fries and watching Jonny absentmindedly lick gravy off his fingertips.

“Next, a shower,” says Annik, clutching at her chocolate smoothie. “Then about ten hours of sleep.”

“Still got about an hour-and-a-half left to go,” Jonny reminds them. They groan, and Pat shoves Jonny over so he can get out of the booth to piss before the rest of the drive.

When he gets back, Andy and Dana are in the back seat and Jonny’s leaning against the passenger-side door of the SUV. Pat pauses, question on his face.

“Matt offered to drive mine,” Jonny says, tilting his head back to the other car. “If that’s—”

“S’cool,” Pat interrupts, stomach twisting and then settling. “I need somebody to talk to if I’m not gonna end up killing us in a food coma.”

Jonny grins, only a little uncertain around the edges, and gets in. Pat rounds the car and follows suit, turning on the engine, then says, “So talk to me, man.” He checks his rear-view and pulls back onto the road.

“‘Bout what?”

“I do not even care,” Pat says, eyes on the road. “Just—talk.”

They’ve been doing this for seven days, now, traveling and talking, and as Jonny starts up about his fall classes, voice low and calm, Pat wonders what it’s going to be like not to have this anymore.

 

~

 

After they hit the city and drop off Roshan, Andy, and Dana, the rest of them unpack the cars at Jonny and Ian’s place. They push through setting up the tents to dry in the back yard and hauling the gear into the kitchen for cleaning, but after that Matt and Pat grab the first showers. After seven days on the water, Pat’s as brown as he’s ever been, but it still turns out that a good half of that was dirt, despite all the swimming they’d done on the first half of the trip. He soaps up and scrubs down in the achingly good heat of the shower.

Jonny’s sitting on the floor in the hall, head tipped back on the wall, when Pat comes out in a towel. “I put your bags in my room,” Jonny says, nodding towards a door down the hall. He takes Pat’s proffered hand and hauls himself up with a groan, falling into Pat’s wet torso.

“Shit, you stink,” Pat says, laughing at Jonny’s wounded look. “What, I bet I wasn’t a rose before, either. Go shower.”

Jonny rubs his hand on Pat’s face in revenge, and then trips into the washroom. Pat heads into Jonny’s room and digs out clean jeans and a t-shirt and then collapses onto Jonny’s bed, closing his eyes for just a minute.

He wakes to a change in the light, blinking into the dim room and spotting Jonny by the window, pulling the blinds down. “How long was I out for?”

“Not long,” Jonny says. “I just got dressed. You can sleep, if you want.”

“Nah,” Pat says, sliding his feet to the floor and cracking his neck. “Too early. And I gotta check back into my hotel.”

“Where?” Jonny asks.

“The Westin?”

“Oh, just over—” Jonny gestures in what could be the direction of the hotel, Pat has no idea.

“Right downtown? It’s where the team stays,” Pat says. “My flight’s tomorrow at noon.”

Jonny rocks on the balls of his feet, hand on his jaw, and says, “You could stay here.”

Pat blinks, considering. He glances around the room on instinct, not that he needs five-stars or cares about the mess, but—it’s not just Jonny’s mess. There’s shoes that wouldn’t fit him in the corner, a pile of cycling magazines next to the bed and a second laptop shoved back on the desk.

Jonny sees him seeing and grimaces. “Or not.”

Pat huffs a laugh and passes a hand over his face. “Yeah, I should—it’s booked, I should use it.” It’s his turn to pause and then say, “Or, you know. We could.”

“Okay,” Jonny says, easy. “But first, I need a fucking beer.”

Pat has no objections to that.

 

~

 

Pat parks his car at the hotel and checks in, leaving Jonny in the lobby just long enough to dump his bags by the door, and then lets Jonny guide them a couple of blocks, past generic irish pubs and enormous shiny bars to the diviest dive Pat’s visited in ages.

“Jesus, is this a strip club?” Pat says, glancing up at the sign overhead.

Jonny laughs, shoving him through the door. “No, but it’s under one. Used to be part of it, hence the…” he waves a hand at the wall of mirrors on one side. It’s all that remains of the bar’s former purpose; now there’s just an unglamourous bar at the back, two pool tables, and a disorganized assortment of well-worn chairs and tables. The patrons are a mix of grizzled old drunks and young punks with wild hair and faces full of metal. Pat feels decidedly out of place and says as much when Jonny comes back with a pitcher and two glasses.

“It’s great, eh?” Jonny enthuses, leaning back in his chair and grinning. “Nobody gives a shit here, it’s just a good place to drink. Pool’s a buck twenty-five, too.”

“You any good?” Pat asks, waggling his eyebrows.

“Guess you’ll have to see, Kane,” Jonny says. “Unless you’re worried about losing.”

“You,” Pat says, tipping his glass at Jonny, “are gonna regret that.”

Pat wins the first, then loses the next two to Jonny’s shitty heckling and that stretch of skin above the waist of Jonny’s shorts when he bends over to take a shot. They get challenged for the table by a couple of girls with nose-rings and tattoos, but doubles is enough fun that the four of them play the table twice more before Jonny tucks his chin over Pat’s shoulder and calls it a night.

It’s foolish, but Pat keeps his hand in Jonny’s as they walk back to the hotel. They pass a pharmacy, and Pat shakes his head when Jonny asks if they need anything.

“I’ve got stuff,” he adds, at Jonny’s curious glance. “For whatever,” he adds, flushing.

“Whatever, eh?” Jonny says.

“For you to fuck me,” Pat says, pulse pounding, tongue thick. “If you want.”

Jonny twists his hand in Patrick’s, lacing their fingers together. “Yeah, I—yes.”

“Good,” Pat says, shaky.

 

~

 

Up in the room, Pat tells Jonny to settle in, that he’s going to grab a shower. Jonny makes a face and tries to draw him back, saying he doesn’t need to, but Pat’s nervous and needs space to breathe. He can’t quite put it into words, but whatever’s on his face makes Jonny frown and step back.  

“Listen,” Jonny says, “if it’s freaking you out, you don’t have to. You can fuck me, or we can do other things.”

Pat shakes his head, licking at his lips, trying to figure out how to explain. He wants this for himself like he never has before, something more than being fifteen and careless and getting his hand on a teammate’s dick, or shitty drunk blow jobs with strangers. Maybe he could fuck Jonny, maybe that would be enough, but he likes how Jonny’s pushed him around, likes it enough that the thought makes him flush hot and turn his face from Jonny’s penetrating stare.

“I want to,” Pat says finally. “And hey,” he adds, looking back up with half a grin, “if it’s awful, I’m leaving tomorrow.”

“Yeah, cause an awkward morning after really would be the worst part,” Jonny says, rolling his eyes, but he lets Patrick go.

Patrick’s quick about it, keeps his hair dry and takes only a moment to splay his fingers against the cool tile of the shower wall, breathing deeply to calm his heart rate. When he comes out of the bathroom, towel slung around his hips, Jonny looks up from his sprawl along the lounge chair by the window, sliding his phone onto the coffee table beside him.

“All good?” Jonny asks.

Pat nods, leaves the towel in a puddle at the foot of the bed, and comes over to Jonny’s side. Jonny’s hand comes up to grip Pat’s hip and thumb at his damp skin. Pat lets Jonny pull him over his lap, knees tucked in beside Jonny’s hips, and then down for a kiss.

Jonny maps out Pat’s body with his hands while they kiss. Pat can feel him picking out muscles, sweeping over obliques and abs and pecs, cupping his deltoids and sliding down over biceps, and then dropping to Pat’s quads where they’re straining to hold him over Jonny’s thighs. Pat pulls away from the kiss when Jonny slides his thumbs into the creases of his thighs and down to stroke at his sac.

“Lube?” Jonny says, looking up at Pat with dark eyes as he trails his knuckles along the back of Pat’s stiff cock.

“Yeah,” Pat says, and then realizes he has to move to get it. “Fuck. One sec.” Jonny strips off his t-shirt while Pat’s digging it out of his suitcase, and lifts his hips to slide out his belt as Pat comes back. When he’s done, Pat crawls back on top, pressing the tube into Jonny’s open palm and a kiss to his red mouth.

Pat starts when Jonny wraps a slick hand around his cock and strokes. Jonny grins against his mouth, nipping at his lower lip. “Don’t tell me this isn’t what you do with this,” Jonny says, twisting his fist over the head of Pat’s cock.

“Just, shit,” Pat says, pressing his forehead to Jonny’s shoulder to watch the glistening slide of his dick in Jonny’s big hand. “Was expecting something else.”

Jonny bites his ear, says, “Can you even say it?” He sounds amused.

Pat stays quiet except for harsh pants. Jonny slows his hand until he’s just holding the head of Pat’s cock in his fist, and reaches between Pat’s legs to squeeze his balls tight. Pat whimpers and bites down on Jonny’s shoulder, holding his body still, holding his breath, his words.

Jonny doesn’t make him say it. He strokes Pat’s cock and slips his fingers back, rubbing at Pat’s hole like that night in the tent. It feels like less of a tease, this time, and Pat’s not begging for it. The slick circling touch gives way to the singular sensation of Jonny working inside, opening Pat up around one thick finger. Pat’s breathing shallowly into Jonny’s neck, one hand tight on Jonny’s bicep, the other braced beside Jonny’s head, holding him up. His hips jerk, buttocks tightening against Jonny’s hand, when Jonny forces in a second finger.

Jonny turns his head and licks at Pat’s ear, works his cock to distract him from the uneasy stretch. His breath is heavy, arousal evident in the groan that slips out of his throat when Pat clenches tight. Pat thinks about reaching down and getting Jonny’s dick out of his shorts, but then Jonny starts fucking him steadily with his fingers, wrist brushing Pat’s balls. Pat bites down on his shoulder instead and tries to hold still.

“Hurts?” Jonny asks.

“It—” Pat says. It does, it doesn’t. It’s not pain like a puck to the thigh or a stick to the wrist, but it isn’t comfortable. He wants to shy away from the intrusion, but more than that, he wants to know what it’s like to take Jonny in.

“Want me to stop?” Jonny stills his fingers, thumb rubbing against Pat’s perineum, and that feels...Jonny starts to pull out, and Pat makes a sound in the back of his throat and pushes back.

“No, I,” Pat says, gasping as Jonny pushes in, deeper still. “I wanna feel it.”

Three is—it’s harder, but it’s better, too. Less ambiguous, more biting and something Pat can wrap his head around, grit his teeth against until the stretch fades and he just feels full. He lifts his head, finally, and leans back, hovering over Jonny’s thighs. Jonny’s eyes skate over Pat’s face, his flaming red cheeks, bitten lips, mussed hair. Pat ducks his chin, going redder still, and pops the button on Jonny’s fly. Jonny’s fingers twitch inside him, and Pat touches his wrist to urge him out.

Jonny finds the lube and squeezes some into the palm of Pat’s hand. He watches, hips shifting restlessly, as Pat pulls his dick out and gets him wet. Pat rubs his thumb over the spongy head and kneels up, letting Jonny takes himself in hand, instead. Pat braces his forearms on the back of the chair, thighs shaking as he lowers himself down.

Jonny’s cock slips against his crack. Pat shifts back, gets the head pressed up against him, and then freezes, sucking in thin breaths. He’s closed up tight again, hole clenched against the pressure of Jonny’s dick. There’s a cold line of fear keeping him from sinking down and letting Jonny’s cock breach him.

“Fuck,” he says. “I can’t—”

“Hey,” Jonny says, pushing his dick back down to his belly, hands finding Pat’s hips. “We don’t—”

Pat drops his head, forehead knocking Jonny’s too hard. He laughs; it’s edging on hysterical. “I want to, I just—I need you to do it. To me. I can’t, like this.” He pushes back. Jonny’s staring at him, brow furrowed. “Don’t ask me if I’m sure.”

“I won’t,” Jonny says, and Pat sees a glimpse of the man who said he wouldn’t be nice. He urges Pat up and walks him back to the bed before ducking his head to kiss Pat thoroughly. He cups Pat’s ass and slides his slick fingers between the cheeks, pressing the thick tips of two fingers into Pat’s hole. Pat groans and bites at Jonny’s collarbone, hips flexing, pushing his semi into the muscle of Jonny’s thigh until it’s flushed and firm again. Jonny dips in and out of his hole, sucking at the lobe of Pat’s ear and letting Pat gnaw at his skin.

It isn’t enough. Jonny fucks Pat shallowly with his fingers until Pat’s squirming against him, flushed and sweating. They’re plastered together, thigh to cheek; Pat wants to crawl inside Jonny’s skin, wants Jonny to bury himself inside him. “Fuck, I want,” Pat pants. “Please.”

Jonny cups his ass with a broad palm and hitches him up, his fingers sinking in just that little bit more. Pat’s cock slides in the mess up lube between them, rubbing up against Jonny’s. “I could just do this,” Jonny murmurs in his ear. “Finger you while you rub off on me.”

Pat shudders, hips jerking, ass clenching tight around Jonny’s fingers. Jonny stills, and Pat tilts his head to mouth at his jaw, mouth sliding wetly up to meet Jonny’s. “I want your cock,” he breathes against Jonny’s lips. “I want you to stop being nice.”

Jonny catches Pat’s words with his tongue and then pulls his fingers out, turning Pat around with broad hands on his hips. Pat thinks of Jonny’s steady hands on the grip of a paddle, the learned twist of his torso on each stroke, his sharp gaze on the miles of shoreline, and goes.

“On the edge, babe, just like that,” he says, guiding Pat up onto the bed, knees spread wide. Pat leans over, head on his arms, toes curling into the air. He can feel his hole spasm open, empty, as Jonny drags a thumb down his crack, catching on the rim. Jonny wraps one hand around Pat’s shoulder, keeping him steady, and pulls him back onto his dick until the head is prying Pat open.

Pat gasps and bites his forearm. There’s nowhere to go, no way to avoid the slow press of Jonny’s dick inside him, and he flashes back to the way Jonny pulled Pat’s mouth down onto his cock, that first time in the tent. It’s the same pleasure, underneath the discomfort and fear. When Jonny starts fucking him in short strokes, just an inch in and out that burns against the rim of Pat’s hole, Pat lets himself sink down to the bed and take it, tension falling out of his limbs as Jonny works inside. Fuck, _inside_ him.

Pat met Jonny a week ago, years ago, a lifetime ago. Pat watched on the bench as Jonny broke Pat’s heart in a shootout win and watched the game tape where Jonny broke his own heart and thinks he doesn’t know whose turn it is anymore. He wanted to know what it felt like to be taken; he didn’t realize it would feel like he wants to give everything away.

He says—he says none of it. He says _Jonny_ and _please_ and _fuck, your cock_ and says nothing. Jonny says _Pat_ and curls over him, fingers of one hand spread over the back of Pat’s neck to push him into the bed. The rest dig into Pat’s hip to hold him steady while he fills Pat up, coming with a throaty groan.

Pat can’t move himself, legs trembling, can hardly work with Jonny to flip over and shift up the bed. Jonny pulls Pat into the curve of his body and grips his dick gently, thick and soft on Pat’s thigh. “This okay?” Jonny murmurs in Pat’s ear. Pat arches back against him, twisting to find Jonny’s mouth. Jonny kisses him, wet and lazy after coming, and jerks him until Pat’s hard and gasping and then spilling onto the bedspread, ass clenching down on nothing.

Afterwards, when they’ve half-heartedly wiped off and struggled under the bedcovers, Pat says, “God damnit.” He shuts his eyes tight, hands curling into fists beside him on the bed. Jonny shifts, his hip bumping Pat’s knuckles. “Just—”

“Yeah,” says Jonny. "I know."

 

~

 

There’s a moment after Jonny comes out of the shower, the next morning, when Pat thinks _one last time_ and considers dropping to his knees to take Jonny’s dick in his mouth. He doesn’t, though, instead he meets Jonny’s eyes with a grin and a shrug and lets him dress in yesterday’s clothes to go down to the restaurant for breakfast. There wasn’t anything direct to Buffalo, so he’s got a day of short flights and long layovers ahead.

They fill their plates at the buffet and sit down across from each other, silent until Jonny puts down his coffee with a sigh and says, “This sucks.”

“Well, it’s just a hotel buffet,” Pat says.

Jonny rolls his eyes and looks away. “I should have just left.”

Pat exhales. “That would have—I’m glad you didn’t.”

Jonny nods and goes back to his food, quiet.

“When’s Luca getting back?” Pat asks, wincing as soon as it’s out of his mouth.

Jonny lifts a shoulder. “Two or three weeks, I think. Not sure he has a return flight, yet.”

“Not too long, then,” Pat says, like this will be easier if he reminds himself that Jonny isn’t, couldn’t be, was never going to be _his_.

Jonny looks up at him, expression sharp like he knows exactly what Pat’s thinking. “I’m going to end it. For good.”

“You—” Pat starts. He picks up his coffee, puts it down. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Not because of you,” Jonny says, ignoring the question. “It wasn’t working.” He bites off a piece of toast and jam, thumbing where a spot of it catches on his lip. Pat looks up from his mouth.

“How long have you been together?” Pat asks, curiosity overriding his misery.

“Couple years,” Jonny says.

“Jesus,” Pat says.

“It’s not—we took a break for a reason. We weren’t fitting together, anymore,” Jonny says.

“Why a break?” Pat asks. “And not just ending it?”

Jonny shrugs. “Inertia? And it’s—sometimes it’s hard to see that it’s not right, when you’re in it.” His smiles, a small, lopsided grin. “Or it was for me.”

“Oh,” Pat says, and Jonny sighs.

“I’m not ending it ‘cause of you,” Jonny says patiently. “That would be dumb, we’re not—there’s nothing that can happen, here, right?” Pat nods and Jonny goes on. “But I’m not saying this week didn’t help, like,” he waves a hand. “It made it clear. But I think I knew it was gonna go like this a long time ago.”

“Right,” Pat says. “Glad to be helpful, then.”

Jonny says, “C’mon, don’t.”

“Sorry,” Pat says. He picks at his breakfast. “I guess I can live with that,” he says.

Jonny snorts. “Oh, good.”

Pat looks up and smiles. “In exchange for one thing,” he says, pulling out his phone.

“On top of last night?” Jonny says, smiling back and holding out his hand.

 

~

 

Pat gets off his flight in Buffalo, carry-on in one hand, phone in the other. He fumbles with it, turning the reception back on, and stops just outside the gate to send a text two-handed.

_gonna sign with the hawks_

Jonny texts him back right away.

_glad you figured out what you want_

 

~

 

THE END

 

~

**Author's Note:**

> I am as always too often on tumblr, where you can read about how this fic once was about [pancakes and pumpkinholes](http://demotu.tumblr.com/post/102644193311/its-pretty-hard-for-me-to-write-at-work-not).


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